Lymphatic Forum 2017Exploring the Lymphatic Continuum

June 8-10, 2017

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Read Testimonials from Travel Award Winners

I am very grateful that I received a travel award from NAVBO to attend the 2017 Lymphatic Forum, held in Chicago, Illinois. The atmosphere of the 2017 Lymphatic Forum was very nice. I experienced three days full of unpublished data, deep scientific discussions and interesting poster sessions. After attending the GRC Lymphatics in March 2017 in Ventura (as my first lymphatic conference), I met a lot of the researchers in the lymphatic field again; the conference was a very good opportunity to hear about the development of ongoing projects and novel ideas. Everyone was open to meet, discuss and share ideas and thoughts. Together with Dr. Sinem Karaman, Dr. Kaska Koltowska and Dr. Maximilian Nitschke, I am currently organizing the GRS Lymphatics 2018 in Lucca, Italy. This conference helped me/us a lot to define and create a program for next year addressing the current hot topics in the lymphatic field.

Maike Frye, Ph.D.(currently a Postdoc at the University of Uppsala, Sweden, under the supervision of Taija Mäkinen)

It was a great event and everything was very well planned and organized. It’s highly appreciated that there are travel awards granted to many young scientists joining this event from all other countries outside the US. As participants, we had a great time talking to world-leading scientists and colleagues within the lymphatic community. I learned a lot as a graduate student from the lectures, posters and discussions that I found really helpful for my projects as well as career development. It was also a great experience to make new collaborations and new friends. Chicago has a beautiful downtown with a perfect location and amazing people. Everything together makes this trip an unforgettable experience!

The 2017 Lymphatic Forum is a great opportunity for me to know people and their stunning research in lymphatic field across the world. As I mentioned, I am new to this field. Therefore, attending the lymphatic Forum really provided me with the overall view of this field instead of focusing merely on my specific research. Knowing people and their research in lymphatic field also helped me connect my specific research with other people's work, and think about collaboration with other groups. The 2017 Lymphatic Forum included both basic research and clinical research, which connected scientists with doctors who see patients with lymphatic diseases. First, this reminds our scientists of how important our research in lymphatic field is; second, this connection also led us to develop our basic research to better help doctors and patients understand and cure the diseases. The talks and poster presentation both showed advanced and exciting research, resulting in amazing discussion and suggestions. I also would like to thank the meeting organizer to give me the opportunity to present my work and talk to some people during poster session. I received wonderful feedbacks and different ideas, which is always a researcher really wants to obtain from a meeting. The size of the meeting was also great, which was not too big but included all the different sub-fields in lymphatic research. One of the reasons that I enjoyed this meeting is that I could easily recognize and find the person I wanted to talk to. Besides, the location of the meeting was really nice and convenient. Everything is within walking-distance. To summarize, the 2017 Lymphatic Forum expanded my knowledge in lymphatic research, strengthened my resolve to study lymphatic system, and provided me with connections with other researchers. Thank you again for organizing such a wonderful meeting and the support for me to travel to the meeting.

My research is focuses on the lymphangiogenic molecule, vascular endothelial growth factor-c (VEGF-C) and its activation in vivo and in vitro. The goal is to utilize the activation mechanism of VEGF-C as a therapeutic target in pathological conditions like lymphedema, inflammation, tumor metastasis etc.

I had a wonderful experience attending the Lymphatic Forum 2017. The conference was full of exciting talks and covered different aspects of lymphatic biology, be it basic or clinical. I came across lot of influential researchers in the field of lymphatic biology and had chance to interact with them personally. I also made some good friends in the meeting. The most important part of the meeting was discussions during the poster sessions with lot of young talents, giving entirely new perspectives of the field. I established some collaborations and will certainly continue to interact with the people I met during the meeting.

I would like to thank NAVBO for the travel award. I would also like to thank the organizers for making this conference very informative and interactive. This kind of honor will surely encourage a graduate student like me to continue working and contribute to the field of lymphatic research.

Sawan Jha, University of Helsinki, PhD studies under the supervision of Michael Jeltsch and Kari Alitalo

We gratefully acknowledge support from our Partners listed on the left

Funding for this conference was made possible (in part) by 1R13HL136113-01 from the National Institutes of Health. The views expressed in written conference materials or publications and by speakers and moderators do not necessarily reflect the official policies of the Department of Health and Human Services; nor does mention of trade names, commercial practices, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.